The theory of a complete change of standards in human history does not merely deprive us of the pleasure of honouring our fathers; it deprives us even of the more modern and aristocratic pleasure of despising them.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
It is vain for eloquent atheists to talk of the great truths that will be revealed if once we see free thought begin. We have seen it end. It has no more questions to ask; it has questioned itself.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Art is limitation; the essence of every picture is the frame.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Thinking in isolation and with pride ends in being an idiot. Every man who will not have softening of the heart must at last have softening of the brain.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
We can say why we take liberty from a man who takes liberties. But we cannot say why an egg can turn into a chicken any more than we can say why a bear could turn into a fairy prince. As IDEAS, the egg and the chicken are further off from each other than the bear and the prince; for no egg in itself suggests a chicken, whereas some princes do suggest bears.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Every man has forgotten who he is. One may understand the cosmos, but never the ego; the self is more distant than any star.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
And it seemed to me that existence was itself so very eccentric a legacy that I could not complain of not understanding the limitations of the vision when I did not understand the vision they limited. The frame was no stranger than the picture.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
The size of this scientific universe gave one no novelty, no relief. The cosmos went on for ever, but not in its wildest constellation could there be anything really interesting; anything, for instance, such as forgiveness or free will. The grandeur or infinity of the secret of its cosmos added nothing to it.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
It is mere sentiment to rejoice that the sun is larger than the earth; it is quite as sane a sentiment to rejoice that the sun is no larger than it is. A man chooses to have an emotion about the largeness of the world; why should he not choose to have an emotion about its smallness?
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
For about infinity there was a sort of carelessness which was the reverse of the fierce and pious care which I felt touching the pricelessness and the peril of life.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
It is a good exercise, in empty or ugly hours of the day, to look at anything, the coal-scuttle or the book-case, and think how happy one could be to have brought it out of the sinking ship on to the solitary island. But it is a better exercise still to remember how all things have had this hair-breadth escape: everything has been saved from a wreck.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Men spoke much in my boyhood of restricted or ruined men of genius: and it was common to say that many a man was a Great Might-Have-Been. To me it is a more solid and startling fact that any man in the street is a Great Might-Not-Have-Been.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
first, that this world does not explain itself. It may be a miracle with a supernatural explanation; it may be a conjuring trick, with a natural explanation. But the explanation of the conjuring trick, if it is to satisfy me, will have to be better than the natural explanations I have heard.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Fourth, that the proper form of thanks to it is some form of humility and restraint: we should thank God for beer and Burgundy by not drinking too much of them. We owed, also, an obedience to whatever made us.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
And last, and strangest, there had come into my mind a vague and vast impression that in some way all good was a remnant to be stored and held sacred out of some primordial ruin.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Upon the whole, I came to the conclusion that the optimist thought everything good except the pessimist, and that the pessimist thought everything bad, except himself.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
My acceptance of the universe is not optimism, it is more like patriotism. It is a matter of primary loyalty.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
The point is not that this world is too sad to love or too glad not to love; the point is that when you do love a thing, its gladness is a reason for loving it, and its sadness a reason for loving it more.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Men did not love Rome because she was great. She was great because they had loved her.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
The evil of the pessimist is, then, not that he chastises gods and men, but that he does not love what he chastises--he has not this primary and supernatural loyalty to things.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Obviously, it is felt that the optimist, wishing to defend the honour of this world, will defend the indefensible.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
The more transcendental is your patriotism, the more practical are your politics.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
She underrated his virtue, though she overrated his value.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Love is not blind; that is the last thing that it is. Love is bound; and the more it is bound the less it is blind.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Can he hate it enough to change it, and yet love it enough to think it worth changing? Can he look up at its colossal good without once feeling acquiescence? Can he look up at its colossal evil without once feeling despair? Can he, in short, be at once not only a pessimist and an optimist, but a fanatical pessimist and a fanatical optimist? Is he enough of a pagan to die for the world, and enough of a Christian to die to it?
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Not only is suicide a sin, it is the sin. It is the ultimate and absolute evil, the refusal to take an interest in existence; the refusal to take the oath of loyalty to life. The man who kills a man, kills a man. The man who kills himself, kills all men; as far as he is concerned he wipes out the world.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
A martyr is a man who cares so much for something outside him, that he forgets his own personal life. A suicide is a man who cares so little for anything outside him, that he wants to see the last of everything.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Christianity was accused, at one and the same time, of being too optimistic about the universe and of being too pessimistic about the world. The coincidence made me suddenly stand still.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
An imbecile habit has arisen in modern controversy of saying that such and such a creed can be held in one age but cannot be held in another. Some dogma, we are told, was credible in the twelfth century, but is not credible in the twentieth. You might as well say that a certain philosophy can be believed on Mondays, but cannot be believed on Tuesdays. You might as well say of a view of the cosmos that it was suitable to half-past three, but not suitable to half-past four. What a man can believe depends upon his philosophy, not upon the clock or the century.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Of all horrible religions the most horrible is the worship of the god within.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Physical nature must not be made the direct object of obedience; it must be enjoyed, not worshipped.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
The very people who reproached Christianity with the meekness and non-resistance of the monasteries were the very people who reproached it also with the violence and valour of the Crusades.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
I found it was their daily taunt against Christianity that it was the light of one people and had left all others to die in the dark. But I also found that it was their special boast for themselves that science and progress were the discovery of one people, and that all other peoples had died in the dark.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
One can hardly think too little of one's self. One can hardly think too much of one's soul.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Christianity came in here as before. It came in startlingly with a sword, and clove one thing from another. It divided the crime from the criminal. The criminal we must forgive unto seventy times seven. The crime we must not forgive at all.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
You cannot even say that there is victory or superiority in nature unless you have some doctrine about what things are superior.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
This is the only really healthy way with the word evolution, to work for what you want, and to call THAT evolution. The only intelligible sense that progress or advance can have among men, is that we have a definite vision, and that we wish to make the whole world like that vision.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Progress should mean that we are always changing the world to suit the vision. Progress does mean (just now) that we are always changing the vision.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Let beliefs fade fast and frequently, if you wish institutions to remain the same.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
The modern young man will never change his environment; for he will always change his mind.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
You may alter the place to which you are going; but you cannot alter the place from which you have come.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
In the upper world hell once rebelled against heaven. But in this world heaven is rebelling against hell.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
The main point of Christianity was this: that Nature is not our mother: Nature is our sister. We can be proud of her beauty, since we have the same father; but she has no authority over us; we have to admire, but not to imitate.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
The whole point depends upon his being at once humble enough to wonder, and haughty enough to defy. So our attitude to the giant of the world must not merely be increasing delicacy or increasing contempt: it must be one particular proportion of the two--which is exactly right.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
But all conservatism is based upon the idea that if you leave things alone you leave them as they are. But you do not. If you leave a thing alone you leave it to a torrent of change.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
So again, we have almost up to the last instant trusted the newspapers as organs of public opinion. Just recently some of us have seen (not slowly, but with a start) that they are obviously nothing of the kind. They are, by the nature of the case, the hobbies of a few rich men.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
We have not any need to rebel against antiquity; we have to rebel against novelty.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
This startling swiftness with which popular systems turn oppressive is the third fact for which we shall ask our perfect theory of progress to allow. It must always be on the look out for every privilege being abused, for every working right becoming a wrong.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
we have not got to crown the exceptional man who knows he can rule. Rather we must crown the much more exceptional man who knows he can't.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Angels can fly because they can take themselves lightly.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
For solemnity flows out of men naturally; but laughter is a leap.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
The man of the nineteenth century did not disbelieve in the Resurrection because his liberal Christianity allowed him to doubt it. He disbelieved in it because his very strict materialism did not allow him to believe it.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
In their doubt of miracles there was a faith in a fixed and godless fate; a deep and sincere faith in the incurable routine of the cosmos. The doubts of the agnostic were only the dogmas of the monist.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
They agree in machinery; almost every great religion on earth works with the same external methods, with priests, scriptures, altars, sworn brotherhoods, special feasts. They agree in the mode of teaching; what they differ about is the thing to be taught.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
If we want reform, we must adhere to orthodoxy: especially in this matter (so much disputed in the counsels of Mr. R.J.Campbell), the matter of insisting on the immanent or the transcendent deity.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Insisting that God is inside man, man is always inside himself. By insisting that God transcends man, man has transcended himself.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
The secularists have not wrecked divine things; but the secularists have wrecked secular things, if that is any comfort to them.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
If you leave off looking at books about beasts and men, if you begin to look at beasts and men then (if you have any humour or imagination, any sense of the frantic or the farcical) you will observe that the startling thing is not how like man is to the brutes, but how unlike he is. It is the monstrous scale of his divergence that requires an explanation.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
Somehow or other an extraordinary idea has arisen that the disbelievers in miracles consider them coldly and fairly, while believers in miracles accept them only in connection with some dogma. The fact is quite the other way. The believers in miracles accept them (rightly or wrongly) because they have evidence for them. The disbelievers in miracles deny them (rightly or wrongly) because they have a doctrine against them.
Orthodoxy
G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
I felt sure that the creature was what we call “good,” but I wasn’t sure whether I liked “goodness” so much as I had supposed. This is a very terrible experience. As long as what you are afraid of is something evil, you may still hope that the good may come to your rescue. But suppose you struggle through to the good and find that is also dreadful?
Perelandra: (Space Trilogy, Book Two) (The Space Trilogy 2)
C. S. Lewis
You might say, if you liked, that the power of choice had been simply set aside and an inflexible destiny substituted for it. On the other hand, you might say that he had been delivered from the rhetoric of his passions and had emerged into unassailable freedom. Ransom could not, for the life of him, see any difference between these two statements.
Perelandra: (Space Trilogy, Book Two) (The Space Trilogy 2)
C. S. Lewis
We have learned of evil, though not as the Evil One wished us to learn. We have learned better than that, and know it more, for it is waking that understands sleep and not sleep that understands waking. There is an ignorance of evil that comes from being young: there is a darker ignorance that comes from doing it, as men by sleeping lose the knowledge of sleep.
Perelandra: (Space Trilogy, Book Two) (The Space Trilogy 2)
C. S. Lewis
Love me, my brothers, for I am infinitely superfluous, and your love shall be like His, born neither of your need nor of my deserving, but a plain bounty.
Perelandra: (Space Trilogy, Book Two) (The Space Trilogy 2)
C. S. Lewis
FROM BIBLES TO DRILL BITS
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
He preferred to work with countries that would respect Saudi Arabia’s sovereignty and with professionals like Harrison and Dame, who seemed free of European imperialist agendas.
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
Ebb and Flow
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
serious repercussions on American oil interests in Saudi Arabia,” one CASOC executive warned. “[It] might even result in their expulsion.”4
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
In secret conversations with the historian George Antonius, Iraqi premier Nuri al-Sa’id, and St. John Philby, the apostate Saudi adviser,
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
In a formal address to the king, bedecked for the occasion in the robes of an Arabian prince, Hurley expressed confidence that the Saudis would someday champion the establishment of a union of Arab states based “on principles similar to those embodied in the Constitution.”
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
Stalin was now poised to sever America’s access to Iranian oil reserves and to threaten the petroleum fields of Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, and Kuwait. Reporting from Tabriz, the Associated Press correspondent Joseph C. Goodwin claimed he could scarcely hear his own shortwave radio for the thunder of passing Soviet tanks.
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
“Terror and Silver are the contributing causes of some, if not all, of our troubles,” Truman grumbled. He refused to receive any more Zionist delegations and claimed to have burned an entire stack of telegrams from American Jews. “Jesus Christ couldn’t please them when he was here on this earth,” he pined, “so how would anyone expect that I would have any luck?”
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
fears. Saudi officials threatened to retaliate economically against the United States and intimated the possibility of “underground guerrilla warfare against Americans throughout the Arab World.”
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
This was the country whose representative to the San Remo Conference in 1920 spent the proceedings in a courtyard reading a newspaper, whose policymakers refused to recognize Saudi Arabia when the kingdom was initially proclaimed, and which regarded Palestine—indeed
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
Arab-Israeli peace prior to the 1973 war, for example, or on the evolution of the U.S.-Saudi alliance in the 1950s and 1960s, and little can be added to them in terms of original research.
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
Nasser was waging vicious propaganda wars against America’s Jordanian and Saudi allies, blatantly collaborating with the Soviets, and pressing for the closure of the Wheelus air
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
which would render the Arabs even more dependent on Soviet arms and advisers, and to protect the friendly regimes of Jordan, Iran, and Saudi Arabia. Israel’s security also
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
Exuberant crowds turned out to greet the president in Egypt, Syria, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia, and the Israelis treated him deferentially.
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
SPITE of his avowals to promote freedom and democracy throughout the world, Carter overlooked the pervasive human rights abuses committed by friendly Middle Eastern states such as Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Few regimes were as systematically
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
The closing weeks of 1979 saw a radical Wahhabi uprising in Saudi Arabia; hundreds were killed in an attempt to seize the Grand Mosque in Mecca. In Iraq, a bullish
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
In 1981, for example, he supplied AWACS surveillance aircraft to Saudi Arabia, defeating intense AIPAC efforts to block the sale, and when Arab oil producers protested Israeli steps to annex
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
Saladin and declared holy war against the ungodly Saudis, to whom he also owed billions. Starting in
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
Teheran. More lethally, Saddam fired Scud missiles at coalition camps in Saudi Arabia, in one case killing twenty-eight GIs.
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
draw the Jewish state into the war and so drive Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Syria out of the coalition, Saddam launched thirty-nine of the Soviet-made missiles at Tel
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
the Khobar Towers, a building used to billet U.S. servicemen in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. Nineteen Americans were killed by the blast,
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
major commercial and government buildings. Amply funded by Islamic charities from Saudi Arabia and the Persian Gulf, at least nineteen
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
The White House was ineffective in persuading Yemen to cooperate in the hunt for the Cole’s attackers and reluctant to pressure the Saudis to crack down on terrorist-funding charities. Even
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
Saudi Arabia, and Lebanon could penetrate their country and attack its most prominent city
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
Bush was deeply appreciative of the value of oil and reluctant to alienate its suppliers, especially in Saudi Arabia. He shared Andrew
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
Though Kuwait and Saudi Arabia begrudgingly allowed their deserts to be used as staging
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
Aroused by the Iraqi example, a wave of democratization seemed to sweep the Middle East—in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, where opposition groups began to sprout, and in Lebanon,
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
The Egyptian and Saudi regimes quickly quashed these democratic stirrings,
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
“could undercut the Saudi and Iranian duopoly” and bring dignity to “a people immiserated by three decades
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
adventurers, and businessmen established a historic rapport with the Saudi tribe in Arabia and a monopoly
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
Soviets in Afghanistan and collaborated with the Saudis who were promulgating Islamic extremism.
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
adversaries—Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Israel. “The world’s free nations will not allow tyrants to develop
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia denounced the “illegal foreign occupation” of Iraq, and a
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present
Michael B. Oren
Someone might argue: “The scientist’s formula of the bounce-pass requires a far greater knowledge of physics and far more specific information about speeds of movement and weights than the basketball player actually has, so it must be an unrealistic description of how basketball passes actually occur.” This reaction would be wrongheaded. The fact that a good player can throw the ball accurately because of practice and skill, without making a physics calculation, does not mean that the physics calculation is wrong.
Principles of Economics 2e
Timothy Taylor, Steven A. Greenlaw, David Shapiro, and OpenStax
First, economics is not a form of moral instruction. Rather, it seeks to describe economic behavior as it actually exists. Philosophers draw a distinction between positive statements, which describe the world as it is, and normative statements, which describe how the world should be. Positive statements are factual. They may be true or false, but we can test them, at least in principle. Normative statements are subjective questions of opinion. We cannot test them since we cannot prove opinions to be true or false. They just are opinions based on one's values. For example, an economist could analyze a proposed subway system in a certain city. If the expected benefits exceed the costs, he concludes that the project is worthy—an example of positive analysis. Another economist argues for extended unemployment compensation during the Great Depression because a rich country like the United States should take care of its less fortunate citizens—an example of normative analysis.
Principles of Economics 2e
Timothy Taylor, Steven A. Greenlaw, David Shapiro, and OpenStax
The higher branches of learning consisted of (1) rituals, (2) music, (3) archery, (4) horsemanship, (5) literature, and (6) mathematics. In other words, education embraced moral, military, and intellectual training.
Romance of the Three Kingdoms (with footnotes and maps) (Epic and Beyond Book 1)
Luo Guanzhong and C.H.Brewitt Taylor